Pre-Crown conditioning started the way most bad ideas in Ralaen’s life had started: with a shuttle, too little sleep, and Killgore saying, “You’ll miss this part later.”

  The next weeks blurred into a montage of misery.

  She and Eirik said goodbye to the others in a half-dazed rush. Shoulder-claps. Crushed grips that said more than words. Rude jokes about “don’t come back too shiny.” Hissthar gave them a long, silent nod that carried the weight of a vow.

  Sari cupped her hands around her mouth as the ramp came up.

  “Don’t die, idiots! I have money riding on you!”

  Then the shuttle sealed, engines spooled, and J?tunheim dropped away.

  Pre-Crown conditioning was everywhere and nowhere. They were never told where they were. Earth, yes. But that could mean almost anything.

  One week: high mountains. Thin air clawed at her lungs. Ralaen’s black fur blended into rock and shadow as she crawled along ridgelines with a pack that made Jaeger rucks feel light by comparison. Her thighs burned, shoulders throbbed, paws slipped on frost. An instructor climbed past her at an easy pace, barely breathing hard. “The Crown doesn’t care if you’re tired,” he said. “It only cares if you’re still moving.” So she moved.

  Another week: frozen coastline. Salt wind cut through fur and fabric. Ocean spray froze on her kit. They ran amphibious insertions until her paws went numb and she had to watch her hands to see if they were reloading properly. “Your body will hate you,” one of the cadre said as they staggered up a stony beach. “We’re checking if it quits before you do.”

  Then jungle. Damp heat, insects, and mud that tried to rip her boots from her paws.

  Then desert. Heat slamming off rock. Sand in every seam. Armor that felt like it was cooking her from the inside.

  Ruined cities. High-G chambers that turned every step into a slow grind. Low-light runs where she navigated mostly by instinct and star charts while someone in the dark kept tagging her with training rounds whenever she got lazy.

  Ralaen thought about quitting more than once.

  It always hit around the same point. Hour thirty-something of a multi-day evolution, muscles shaking, vision tunneling, instructors’ voices turning into far-off noise.

  Every time, her mind jumped to the same image: Eirik, somewhere in this same program, under his own weight, under the same rules.

  She pictured him stubbornly pushing forward. The idea of him grinding on while she folded made her stomach twist.

  "I am not quitting on my own path just because his is hard," she told herself. "And I am not going to look him in the eye later and say I gave up when it hurt."

  So, she kept going. One foot. One breath. One more miserable little task checked off.

  Pre-Crown ended the way it began: another shuttle. A brief pause—water, hot food, six full hours of actual uninterrupted sleep that felt unreal. Then a briefing room.

  Anastasia Dragomir stood at the front. No holo of a battlefield this time—just the Crown sigil rotating in the tank behind her.

  “You’ve already been through the gatekeeping,” she said. “Medical, genetic, psych, service record. You cleared the dull part. From here on, you are in the Crown proper.”

  Ralaen already knew the structure from the files Sigrun had walked her through, but hearing it now, with her name on the roster, hit differently.

  “The Body. The Blade. The Will. Then the Choice,” Anastasia said. “You are not here to show off. You are here to prove you will not break, go feral, or forget why we fight.”

  Then they were on a pinnace again. Blindfolds. Gear stripped down to essentials.

  When her blindfold came off, the world was wet rock, sleet, and thin air.

  “Objective package uploaded,” the AI in her ear said. “Phase: The Body. Survive, advance, and complete all tasks. Failure to continue will be treated as voluntary withdrawal.”

  Training misery turned into a checklist. Ralaen trudged under a load heavier than anything Killgore had put on her. Wind hammered at her. Rain turned to sleet and back again. Her fur soaked through, dried, and soaked again before she fully registered the cycle.

  Timed climbs up steep rock with frozen holds that tore at her paw fingers. Forced marches with a portable gravity generator turned up until every step felt multiplied. Controlled “injuries” layered on top: a brace locking one leg partway, then a harness loaded unevenly to wreck her balance.

  Sleep came in scraps whenever the cadre decided they had squeezed enough out of that block.

  “Hydrate. Eat,” the voices on the net reminded them. “If you fall, fall forward.”

  Her world shrank. Next handhold. Next step. Next bite of ration chewed and swallowed even when her stomach complained.

  Somewhere, Eirik was going through another version of this. Knowing that didn’t reduce the weight on her shoulders. It added one of a different kind.

  If he kept moving, she would not be the one to stop.

  They pulled her out of that grind and shoved her straight into the next one. No ceremony. No speech. Just a staging area, a quick rinse to get grit out of her eyes, fresh mags, and a new tag in her HUD.

  “The Blade,” Anastasia had called it. “We see how you fight when everything is against you.”

  Her first scenario: deep raid.

  “You are alone,” the AI said. “Jaeger opposition force: platoon strength. Objectives: sabotage three hardened nodes, secure and exfiltrate a high-value package, and remain alive for recording purposes.”

  “Remain alive” sounded like an afterthought.

  The AO was an old industrial complex. Corridors. Catwalks. Machinery. Too many angles.

  Jaeger OPFOR hunted in disciplined pairs and squads, using moves she recognized because she’d trained in them.

  Head-on fights meant getting cut apart. So, she stopped thinking about winning and focused on breaking them. Noise traps. Misleading flashes. She nudged one patrol into another’s sector and listened to the confusion. She planted charges where they’d chase her, not where they expected objectives. She accepted that she was going to get hit and made sure every time someone tagged her, the scoreboard bled for them too.

  By the time the last node went down and the package beacon pinged green, welts burned along her flank and upper arm. The mission summary gave her marks for objective completion and flagged “needless exposure to fire” in five places.

  Next scenario: choke point defense. One corridor. Multiple waves. Limited ammunition. Timer set to a number that felt insulting.

  She burned through rifle mags, switched to sidearm, then to grenades, then to whatever was in reach. Close-quarters drills she’d done a thousand times turned into broken, gasping movements with every muscle screaming.

  When the timer finally hit zero, she was on the floor, lungs dragging in air, knuckles raw. The AI marked her as “combat ineffective but not withdrawn.”

  The cadre made notes. They didn’t praise. They didn’t need to. The continuation to the next block was its own answer.

  Anastasia hadn't bothered to dress this one up. "Most washouts happen here," she had said. "You can't fake this phase."

  Isolation. No squad. No Eirik. No familiar voices except the neutral AI prompts.

  Environments tuned to grind down whatever was left of a person's patience. Some blocks hit her with constant noise, flashing lights, overlapping orders. Others stripped everything down: low light, almost no sound, long stretches where the only obvious thing to do was walk and listen to her own thoughts.

  Simulated moral knots came layered on top. Hostages she couldn't reach in time. Conflicting orders from "Command" and "local leadership." Scenarios where every available option left someone marked as dead on her HUD, and the evaluators wanted to see which way she leaned and how she carried the aftermath.

  They tracked everything: heart rate, hormones, neural patterns.

  And then there was Eirik.

  She didn't know how many days she'd been alone when the scenario loaded and he was standing there. Same armor. Same stance. Same way he checked his rifle before looking up at her.

  "Hey," he said. "You look like shit."

  Her throat closed. She knew it was a simulation. She knew. But after the silence and the noise and the no-win scenarios with strangers whose faces blurred together, hearing his voice hit her like a physical blow.

  "You're not real," she said.

  He shrugged. "Real enough for government work. Come on—we've got hostages to pull out."

  The mission was clean at first. Compound infiltration. Enemy positions mapped. Hostages confirmed in a hardened structure at the center. She and Eirik moved through it the way they'd moved through dozens of exercises on J?tunheim—covering angles, silent signals, the rhythm of two people who knew how the other thought.

  It felt like breathing again.

  Then the scenario shifted.

  Enemy reinforcements flooded the western approach. The extraction window compressed from minutes to seconds. And the tactical overlay painted the picture in cold, simple geometry.

  Path to hostages: open, but only if someone held the corridor junction.

  Corridor junction: indefensible. Whoever stayed would not leave.

  She saw it. Eirik saw it.

  "Ralaen." His voice was quiet.

  "There's another way," she said. "If we fall back to the secondary—"

  "There isn't." He cut her off, not unkindly. "You know there isn't. The AI doesn't give us scenarios with hidden third options. That's not what this is."

  Her HUD pulsed. Hostage timer counting down. Extraction window narrowing.

  "You go," he said. "I hold the junction. You get them out."

  "No."

  "Ralaen."

  "I said no." Her voice cracked on the word. "I'm not—you don't get to just—"

  He stepped closer. Close enough that she could see the simulation's attention to detail—the small scar near his jaw, the way his eyes caught light.

  He smiled at her.

  Not a grim smile. Not the one people put on when they're being brave about something terrible. The real one—warm, quiet, slightly crooked. The one she'd seen in the mess hall when he was too tired to perform for anyone. The one she'd seen when he looked at her and didn't say anything because he didn't need to.

  "Get them out," he said. "That's the mission. That's what we do."

  The timer pulsed again. Fifteen seconds.

  "I'll see you on the other side," he said. "One way or another."

  She opened her mouth. Nothing came out.

  Ten seconds.

  He turned toward the corridor junction, rifle coming up, and she heard herself speak.

  "Eirik. Hold position and buy us time."

  The words came out steady. She didn't know how.

  "Copy that," he said. He didn't look back.

  She moved. Muscle memory carried her toward the hostages while the sound of gunfire erupted behind her. Her HUD tracked his vitals in the corner of her vision—heartbeat elevated, ammunition counter falling, incoming fire indicators lighting up around his position.

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  She reached the hostages. Started the extraction sequence.

  His ammo counter hit zero. She saw him transition to sidearm.

  She got the first group moving toward the exit.

  The vitals spiked. Loss of integrity warnings flashed across his status feed. Puncture. Hemorrhage. His heartbeat went rapid and thready.

  She completed the extraction. Every hostage out. Timer satisfied. Mission complete.

  His heartbeat flatlined. The marker on her HUD went red, then grey, then disappeared entirely.

  The simulation held for three more seconds of absolute silence.

  Then Eirik's body dissolved into static, and the compound dissolved with it, and she was standing alone in a grey room with nothing but her own breathing and a neutral voice saying, "Scenario complete. Proceed to next evolution."

  She didn't move.

  The voice repeated itself. She still didn't move.

  Something built in her chest—hot, ugly, pressurized. Not grief. Grief would come later, maybe, when she had time to remember this was fake. This was something rawer. The fury of being made to do this. The violation of having him—even a copy of him—used as the knife they put in her hand.

  She found the nearest camera node. Looked directly into it.

  "Fine," she said. Her voice sounded like someone else's. "You want to see if I snap? Is that what this is?"

  Silence.

  "Watch this." She bared her teeth. "I'm going to finish your little test. I'm going to pass every single evolution you put in front of me. And then you can try harder. Because I'm not giving you the satisfaction."

  She turned away from the camera and walked toward the next marker on her HUD.

  Behind her, the grey room stayed silent.

  The days after blurred. More scenarios. More impossible choices. None of them cut as deep as the one with Eirik's smile still burned into her memory.

  She kept moving. One foot. One breath. One more miserable evolution checked off.

  If she broke now, she'd never walk back into J?tunheim as anything but a memory of almost. That wasn't acceptable.

  The final summons came without warning.

  Ralaen stood in the center of the room, a featureless white sphere that felt less like a simulation and more like a pocket of non-existence. The scenario with Eirik—ordering him to his death, watching his vitals flatline while she carried out the mission—had hollowed her out. She was a vessel of exhaustion and bitter memory.

  A figure shimmered into existence. It was her, the Ralaen from a year ago: clean, confident, her Confederacy uniform immaculate.

  "You can stop," the simulation said, its voice a perfect echo of her own. "This is a human delusion, Ralaen. A myth they've wrapped around a death-wish. Walk through that door and you can go back. Be a hero. Live a life that makes sense."

  A door appeared. It promised an end to the pain.

  Ralaen stared at it. A part of her, the deep, weary part, wanted to believe it.

  "They are lying to you," the simulation pressed. "Valhalla isn't real. It's a story they tell themselves so they don't mind dying. There is no Allfather. There is no hall of slain warriors. There is just this. Pain. And then, nothing."

  As it said the word nothing, a profound coldness seeped into the room. It was a chill deeper than any frozen mountain or wind-swept coast. It was the cold of the void, the absolute finality of oblivion. For the first time, Ralaen felt truly, cosmically alone. The universe felt vast, empty, and indifferent.

  She thought of Eirik. She thought of Sigrun's calm certainty. She thought of the human recruits who faced the Rilethi with a kind of fierce joy, as if they were already promised a seat at some great table. Were they all just deluded?

  Then, through the crushing emptiness, she felt something else. A flicker. A warmth so faint it was barely there. It wasn't a voice or a vision. It was a resonance, like the deep, humming note of a massive bell struck in a distant hall. It was the feeling of a great hall filled with fire and laughter, the echo of countless clashes, the weight of a thousand honored gazes. It felt… ancient. And real.

  It was the feeling of being seen.

  It wasn't an answer. It wasn't a promise. It was a presence. A silent acknowledgment from across the veil.

  Ralaen looked at the perfect, comfortable simulation of her old self. Then she looked toward the faint, warm resonance in the void.

  "Maybe you're right," she said to the simulation, her voice raw but clear. "Maybe it is all a story."

  She turned her back on the door and faced the source of the warmth.

  "But it's my story now."

  She spoke to the presence, to the void, to whatever was listening. "I accept."

  The coldness of oblivion vanished as if it had never been. The faint warmth in the distance flared, not into a vision, but into a profound sense of rightness, a current of approval that washed over her. The simulation of her old self dissolved into nothing.

  The calm voice in her ear returned, but it sounded different now, as if it carried a hint of that same distant resonance. "Choice acknowledged. Welcome, Candidate."

  Only then did the blackness roll in, and it felt less like a faint and more like stepping into a warm, waiting sea.

  She came awake to the slam of ramp hydraulics and the jolt of landing. The last thing she remembered clearly was a final movement drill and the strange lightheaded sense that if they asked for one more thing, she’d do it on reflex.

  Now she was on a pinnace again. Her kit hung off her frame like it belonged to someone heavier. Her legs obeyed, but only because she had long practice overriding complaints.

  Eirik sat slumped on a bench, harness still half-clipped. He had shadows under his eyes and the worn-out look she recognized from mirrors. He lifted his head as she climbed into the cabin.

  “Hey,” he said quietly.

  Ralaen dropped into the seat beside him. Her head found his shoulder without her really deciding to move it there.

  “How’d you do?” she rasped.

  He let out a breath that was half sigh. “Didn’t die. Didn’t yell at any evaluators directly. I’m calling that a provisional win until someone tells me otherwise.”

  “Solid standard,” she muttered.

  Sleep hit before she finished the sentence.

  When she woke again, the gravity felt different. The pinnace had settled. She realized, belatedly, that at some point she and Eirik had slid together. Her arm was across his stomach. His hand rested on her hip.

  They both straightened too quickly.

  "Sorry," he said.

  "Don't be," she said, then felt her ears flatten at how that sounded.

  They shared an embarrassed look that somehow made everything worse and better at once.

  The ramp opened.

  This place wasn’t J?tunheim. Einherjar Command rose from the rock in a single monolith of white ferrocrete, all clean planes and deliberate angles. The air felt cleaner. The building’s lines were too precise, too intentional. There was a sense of depth under the surface—hardened infrastructure buried under calm corridors.

  Anastasia waited at the foot of the ramp. Helmet tucked under one arm, armor on, expression steady.

  “Jaeger Andreassen. Jaeger Ralaen,” she said. “Welcome to Einherjar Command.”

  Ralaen’s pulse jumped.

  “From this moment,” Anastasia continued, “you are both accepted as Einherjar candidates. The Crown has judged you worth the effort. Try not to make us regret it.”

  Ralaen honestly wasn’t sure whether she wanted to laugh, cry, or lie flat on the deck.

  They got time to clean up. The showers were mixed. Ralaen lasted a few seconds trying to be relaxed before her brain decided the easiest solution was to stare straight at the tile, wash fast, and pretend nothing else existed.

  You fought Jaegers under live-fire and this is the part that makes you nervous, she told herself. Excellent priorities.

  Fresh fatigues waited afterwards. Not Jaeger black. Einherjar issue—dark green, cut similar but in heavier fabric, with cleaner lines and a neater fall. When she shrugged into the top, the weight settled differently across her shoulders, less like gear and more like a uniform.

  What mattered most was the insignia over the left side of her chest. The rune. The same angular mark Sigrun had once pointed out in chapel and called “the sign of those who stand where others fall.”

  Now it was stitched just above where her heart lay under her black fur. Ralaen touched it with padded fingers. The cloth was smooth; the stitching had a faint texture. The sensation ran straight down into that weight in her chest and settled there. It wasn’t a symbol on a wall anymore. It was hers.

  Then came more scans. More prodding. More numbers.

  Medical came next. Scans, blood draws, the usual poking and prodding compressed into an efficient blur. A med-tech AI with a too-cheerful holo avatar guided her through it.

  "Try not to move. Or die." It paused. "That was humor."

  "I noticed," Ralaen said.

  Then a human doctor—middle-aged, calm, economical—brought up a holo of the Einherjar rune. Clean lines, no decoration.

  "This goes here," he said, tapping his own chest. Left side. Over the heart. "Same placement for all of you."

  Ralaen's paw-hand went to her chest. "Tattoos aren't really an Asuari thing."

  "This one isn't about fashion," he said. "It's an identifier. For you, for us, and for the systems you'll interface with during Ascension."

  The AI added, "We've tuned the ink and carrier to your fur and skin. It will show cleanly through the coat. Very elegant."

  Ralaen snorted. "Glad my chest fur contributes to elegance."

  "Everything counts," the AI said.

  They had her lie back. Shirt off. The air cool on her damp fur. The doctor marked out the lines with efficient care, making sure the rune would sit centered over her heart.

  "You'll feel pressure and heat," he said. "The carrier binds in layers. Try not to claw it off."

  The needle touched down. More than a sting, less than the worst things she'd been through—but it settled strangely. Warmth spread under the fur, along the bone, and stayed there. A faint thrum over her heart.

  When she sat up, the mirror showed black fur, still damp and brushed flat where the doctor had worked, the rune picked out in sharp, dark lines against her coat. It had bonded to the follicles somehow, sitting clean and precise instead of blurring into the fur.

  She inhaled. The rune moved with her chest.

  It didn't feel foreign. It felt like a statement: you stepped across a line, and now there's no pretending you didn't.

  They gave her a room after that. Single bed. Plain walls. Clean sheets. No roommate, no shared snoring, no sudden lights-on.

  She made it as far as dropping face-first onto the bed. Sleep took her without asking for permission.

  Her stomach woke her. For a few seconds she had no idea where she was. The ceiling wasn’t J?tunheim, the sounds were too muted, and there was no one else breathing nearby.

  An AI voice spoke from the wall. “Candidate Ralaen, your metabolic readings are low. The mess is open, I recommend you head there for immediate intake before you attempt any more heroic gestures.”

  “Fine,” she muttered.

  Everything complained when she moved. Not sharp pain—just a deep, worn-out ache in every major muscle. She followed glowing prompts down to the mess.

  The room was busy but calm. Candidates in fresh fatigues. Techs in different colors. Einherjar moving through the space with the kind of unhurried confidence Ralaen now understood had a price tag.

  She stacked her tray: heavy protein, carbohydrates, some greens for show. The smell hit her and nearly buckled her knees.

  Eirik was already at a table, half a tray ahead of her. He looked a little less dead than earlier. Not by much. He nudged the bench. “Sit before you fall.”

  She dropped onto it and started eating. For a while, the only sound between them was cutlery and chewing. They kept glancing at each other, brief, almost disbelieving looks. "We made it through. You’re still here. So am I."

  No speeches. No dramatic vows.

  By the time her tray was empty, the unspoken tension between them wasn’t subtle anymore.

  They both stood up. Leaving the mess hall, their hands found each other on the way out, fingers lacing without either of them really planning it.

  The corridor back to her room felt too short and too long at the same time.

  Stepping through the door to her quarters. The door hissed shut behind them, sealing off the sterile corridors. The silence in the small room was a physical presence, thick with everything unsaid.

  He stood there for a moment, just looking at her. Something flickered across his face—exhaustion, relief, and underneath it, something rawer.

  "I had to watch you die," he said. His voice was steady, but only just. "In one of the scenarios. They made me choose, and I—"

  She crossed the distance between them and kissed him before he could finish. It was a hungry, desperate thing, a culmination of months of forced proximity and shared danger. His lips were firm and chapped, a stark contrast to the softness of her own. Eirik’s response was immediate and just as fierce. His hands, calloused from years of rifle stocks and ropes, came up to grip her hips, pulling her flush against him. He angled his head, deepening the kiss, and it was a clash of teeth and tongues, a frantic, almost clumsy exploration. Her sharp canines grazed his lip, and he didn't even flinch, only pulled her closer.

  He backed her up until her shoulders hit the cool metal of the wall. Her ears, which had been perked with anticipation, flattened back against her black hair in a wave of pure sensation. They broke apart just long enough to yank at the fastenings of their fatigue jackets, their movements hurried and efficient. The discarded uniforms were a heap on the floor.

  His skin was hot even through her fur, a stark, smooth contrast to the dense, short fur of her torso and arms. He kissed her again, his mouth trailing from her lips down the column of her throat. He nipped at the sensitive fur-covered skin where her shoulder met her neck, not gently, but with a possessive edge that made a low sound catch in her throat. Her hands roamed over the broad planes of his back, feeling the shift of wiry muscle and the faint, raised lines of old scars under her fingertips. His hands moved to her breasts, his palms rough and calloused. He cupped their weight, his thumbs brushing over her nipples, which pebbled instantly at the contact through her fur. The touch was direct, unvarnished, and it sent a jolt of pure, unadulterated heat straight to her core. She arched into him, a silent demand for more.

  He answered by lifting her, his rangy strength undeniable as her legs wrapped around his waist. The position pressed the hard ridge of his erection against the thin fabric of her pants. The friction was maddening, exquisite. He braced her against the wall, his mouth claiming hers again as he began to rock against her in a slow, deliberate rhythm. Her tail, which had been lashing with agitation, now thumped softly against the wall in time with his movements, a traitorous tell of her building arousal.

  “Eirik,” she breathed against his lips, the name a ragged plea.

  He set her down, his movements efficient and purposeful. He made quick work of the rest of their clothes, his grey-blue eyes, which could look like cold steel one second, now held a dark, intense focus that was just for her. In the dim light of the room, he looked carved and vital. When they were both naked, he took a moment to just look at her, his gaze sweeping over her athletic build. His eyes lingered on the dark Einherjar rune tattooed over her heart, a sharp mark against her black fur.

  He lowered his head and pressed a soft, almost reverent kiss to the center of the tattoo. The gesture was so unexpected, so gentle, it made her breath hitch. Then he was on her again, lifting her as if she weighed nothing and carrying her the few steps to the narrow bunk. He laid her down gently, a stark contrast to the frantic need from moments before.

  He settled over her, his weight a welcome anchor. He kissed her again, but this time it was slower, deeper. One of his hands slid down her body, his fingers tracing the line of her hip before dipping between her thighs. He found her wet and ready, and he groaned low in his throat. He stroked her with a practiced touch, his fingers clever and sure, stoking the fire inside her until she was writhing beneath him, her breath coming in sharp gasps and her tail thrashing against the blankets.

  “Now,” she demanded, her hands gripping his shoulders. “Eirik, now.”

  He positioned himself at her entrance, pausing for a fraction of a second, his eyes searching hers. She saw the question there. She answered by hooking a leg around his hip and pulling him forward.

  He sank into her in one smooth, deep stroke. The sensation was overwhelming—a perfect, stretching fullness that pushed a cry from her lips. He stilled for a moment, letting her adjust, his forehead resting against hers. The only sounds were their ragged breaths.

  Then he began to move. It wasn't gentle. It wasn't slow. It was a hard, driving rhythm, a desperate, primal claiming. Each thrust was a testament to their survival, a release of every ounce of fear and tension they’d held onto. The sound of skin slapping against fur filled the small room, punctuated by their harsh breaths and guttural moans. Ralaen met him thrust for thrust, her nails digging into the solid muscle of his back, her hips rising to meet his. It was raw and messy and utterly real.

  The pressure inside her built to an unbearable peak, a white-hot coil of tension. She shattered with a sharp cry, her body clamping down around him as waves of pleasure washed over her. He followed her over the edge a moment later with a deep, guttural groan, his body tensing as he found his own release.

  He collapsed on top of her, his weight heavy and grounding. They lay there for a long time, their hearts hammering against each other's ribs, their bodies slick with sweat. Slowly, the frantic energy receded, replaced by a profound, bone-deep sense of peace. One of her hands came up to idly trace the pale scar on his forearm, her claws retracted, her touch infinitely gentle.

  Later, she lay half on top of him, black fur against warm skin, one paw-hand idly tracing circles across his chest. Her muscles ached in a new way that she absolutely did not mind. Happiness felt strange in her chest. Like she'd been bracing for so long she'd forgotten how to stop.

  His hand moved slowly up her back, tracing the line of her spine. Neither of them spoke. They didn't need to.

  For a few minutes, there was nothing else. No trials. No evaluators. No war waiting for them on the other side of Ascension. Just this room, this bed, the rise and fall of his breathing under her ear.

  She let herself believe it could last.

  A chime from the ceiling cut through it.

  "Candidates Ralaen and Andreassen," the AI said. "Please report to Medical Wing Three in twenty minutes for Ascension briefing."

  Ralaen buried her face in his shoulder and groaned.

  "Of course," he said. "Can't let us just exist for more than an hour."